Those that converted and reverts: what helped you connect with the church?

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joyfulandactive

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I am a convert now working in evangelization. I would be really interested to know how you connected to the church and what were your first encounters with Catholics? Did you encounter practicing Catholics “in the wild” i.e. outside the church?
 
As a reverted cradle Catholic, my wife brought Christ to me in a patient and loving way.
So much to say I don’t know where to begin.
Her faith is calm and confident and “of the heart”. It is completely integrated through prayer and family life and friends. Her faith was lived out in her large extended Polish family, and is just part of her nature. She doesn’t agonize over doubts and intellectual quandrys. She just loves people to the best of her ability, prays for a list of people every morning, and keeps asking our kids to come to Mass.
But she’s not going to teach RCIA, or go to Alpha, and she’s not going to talk about her personal relationship with Jesus.

Never underestimate the power of quiet piety in the hands of the Lord.
 
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I set out to disprove the Catholic Church and prove to myself that I was right about its false teachings. I purposefully avoided all Catholics “in the wild” as to not have my research tainted.

If you are trying to evangelize people who are weary of the Catholic Church I would suggest start by listening. Ask them with which doctrines they disagree and then provide biblical evidence that the Catholic teachings are the true ones. I did this with my mother who was at first defensive of my desire to convert. After 15 minutes of her objections and my explanations she, a lifelong Protestant of 67 years, unprovoked said to me, “it sounds like the Catholic Church is the original Christian church”. It almost made me cry because I had the exact same epiphany. It just took me longer.
 
So would you say her witness of living a Christ centered life encouraged you to return? Was there a particular liturgy or event she invited you to? What changed you from thinking about returning to action? This post was to goout
 
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I was reading her mother’s bible in bed one night and I said to her “I’m not sure I believe all of this”. And she was shocked that I would say it. She had a genuine personal concern for me that I might not believe. And that shocked me quite a bit. It made the impression on me that to her, this was the most important thing in our life.

In addition to that, she took on my daughter as a stepmother and loved her. Oh my gracious God…
 
Thanks Bushum. Yes first I listen to the Lord before anything with lots of prayer. I absolutely agree that listening to people is paramount. In fact full on preaching “at” anyone is highly unlikely to be successful IMHO. First and foremost is respect for the other person and listening to them tell you who they are and potentially what they are looking for.

Listening is a highly neglected and underestimated action in our modern world I believe.
 
So goout how long from having that experience to actual response in the form of actively practicing your faith? How much time did you take thinking, mulling and percolating thoughts until it spurred you to do something?
 
Family and married life, going back to Mass together after we had kids, hearing some great homilies. All of this and other events added up to a powerful conversion experience. A light switch moment.
I can’t really connect the dots, but there was a day when it became imperative to follow Christ. And then action and conversion started to follow. I can’t tell you why God so radically changed my heart. I have no explanation. And it’s not for me to demand an answer to that question, it’s simply for me to say yes.
 
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I am moving into this work at the request of my PP. I am very aware of those like myself who are not baptized and have zero experience of Christianity and any church.

The non- practicing Catholics are another group. Then those who are still Christian but decided to attend another Christian community.

Everyone is a unique individual on their own distinct walk with God. I am just very interested in hearing stories and what were the actual events that changed someone to the point of walking through the door of the church.
 
I agree goout we can only respond when we encounter the Living God. It sounds like you were planted in the fertile ground of a rich liturgical life and surrounded by faithful, loving, prayerful Catholics. Eventually you were open enough to encounter the Lord.
 
joyfulandactive said:
I agree goout we can only respond when we encounter the Living God. It sounds like you were planted in the fertile ground of a rich liturgical life and surrounded by faithful, loving, prayerful Catholics. Eventually you were open enough to encounter the Lord.
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Love and commitment is what attracts people to Christ in my opinion.
The choice to be patient, and kind, and willing to put your own skin into someone’ else’s well being.
And of course you must have the practical knowledge of the faith also.
 
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joyfulandactive said:
I agree goout we can only respond when we encounter the Living God. It sounds like you were planted in the fertile ground of a rich liturgical life and surrounded by faithful, loving, prayerful Catholics. Eventually you were open enough to encounter the Lord.
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And as a person comes to know Christ, our human faults come to light. And the consequences of sin become a motivating factor also. When we know healing is available, we want to be healed. Conviction.
And so the Divine Mercy and the sacrament of confession became a big factor. I never conceived that God was personally kind, and generous, and willing to enter into my life and take on my sins and other struggles. And the realization of that is life changing.

I remember on the first Divine Mercy Sunday the priest was talking about the ways to experience God’s mercy. The third one was “get on your knees and ask for it”.
I had never considered that it was that simple and humble.
 
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I think when it comes to reverts, a lot of them didn’t so much make a conscious decision to leave Catholicism as just get lazy, maybe have trouble with some moral teaching that ceased to be an issue later (example: once you’re married, you’re no longer fretting about premarital sexual activities ), and fall off the bandwagon out of boredom or not thinking of Mass or prayer as important.

Eventually some big event like an illness or death jolts some of these folks out of their Rip Van Winkle state and they get back to practicing. Simple as that.
 
I went to a Catholic school where the priest was fantastic, I was encouraged when I told people I wanted to be a nun and got a good education. This eventually made me realize the Catholic Church was not what I thought it was. I played Mary several times and I crowned her at the May Crowning,that was when I accepted her as my mother. Steve Ray’s testimony also helped me.
 
No, I was raised Anglican. I haven’t formally entered the church, but will as soon as I turn 18.
 
So awesome can you describe why you want to become Catholic? Which country are you in by the way?

Thanks so much for your response.
 
I have come to believe that the Catholic Church has the fullness of the sacraments, I have also come to believe that Christ gave us the papacy and he appointed Peter has the first Pope. No other Church has a magisterium like the Catholic Church. After I crowned Mary, I realized how much I love her and finally believed she was the Queen of Heaven. I am in the U.S.
 
I’ve known Catholics my entire life as friends, and I married a Catholic. I divorced a Catholic, and remarried to my wife, also a Catholic. I was always a Protestant, but had fallen away for a period of time. I could see my wife was missing something in her life, and I was also missing my church. Eventually, after I saw Pope Francis streamlined the annulment process, I approached my wife about looking into this, so we could make her right with the church. I also inquired about learning more about the Catholic Faith. The priest suggested RCIA, which was about to begin. He said there was no commitment. My annulment took only four months, and we had our marriage convalidated soon after. I had also decided to join the Church as I learned a great many things in RCIA and in my own readings. I entered the church two years ago, and I’m never leaving. 😀
 
I’m a revert. I grew up with a solid Catholic family but alas it was the terrible late 60s-70s and into the 80s when I came of age and became a young adult. The most uncool thing one could possibly be was a believing Catholic. Everything I was hearing and reading, everything in my schooling–even the Catholic schools–seemed to be actively geared toward watering down or disproving the Catholic faith. My faith was jolted into revival when I studied in Europe as a college student and saw a Catholic culture for the first time–one with magnificent Baroque churches, icons of Mary with candles burning and flowers on streetcorners and country wayside shrines, crucifixes in shops. I had never known that faith could be so integrated into daily life, so natural–and so beautiful. I can’t explain what really happened to bring me back to belief, but that was the catalyst. Thereafter I actively worked on learning more about the faith and growing spiritually. A second catalyst was a series of tragic events that happened to me as a young adult, which made me realize the shortness of life and made me cling to a Savior.
 
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